Can I get a fist pump for GTL?

If you don't know what that stands for, consider yourself among the lucky (and smart) ones.

I've been hearing here and there of a new show on MTV called "Jersey Shore." Bobby Moynihan did a great impression of one of the main characters on Saturday Night Live a few weeks ago. My interest was piqued.

That says a lot, considering I haven't actively turned the channel to MTV in, say, 12 years. Oh, wait, there was that one season when they ran "The Paper" about a high school newspaper staff. I did watch that show each week.

But I digress. I hate MTV these days. Not for the reasons one would assume a 32-year-old would grow to hate it. When I was young (middle and high school) I thought old people wouldn't like MTV because it would be too loud, and they would grow to hate the type of music played on MTV. Little did I know the reason I would grow to hate MTV is because it's not M TV any more. Ridiculous "reality" shows about self-involved 20-somethings just do not hold my interest.

After watching last week's "The Soup" I decided to DVR an episode of "Jersey Shore" so I could see what all the fuss is about. I figured I couldn't deride it til I tried it.

Let the derision begin.

Basically, all you need to know is that GTL stands for "Gym, Tanning, Laundry" which, combined with barhopping, fist pumping and general debauchery, is all the cast members feel they need to do with their lives. I'm hoping that any teens who are watching this stupid show are watching it because they get a good laugh out of it, not because they aspire to be like this and be on MTV.

If you're looking to make a little money in the stock market, look into hair gel, because these gentlemen are ALL ABOUT the hair gel, and god knows it's only a matter of time before it becomes a trend.

I suppose the show is good for a laugh, because Adam, Mitzi, Bets and I got some good laughs out of one we watched last night. Our laughs mostly came from the ridiculous nicknames they've given themselves: Snooki AKA Snookers, Snickers, Mike The Situation, Sammi the Sweetheart, etc.

If you want to find out what your "Jersey Shore" nickname would be, there are a few nickname generators out there. Here's our group nicknames:

Me: The Tight End
Adam: A-Train
Mitzi: The Opportunity
Betsy: Tanny

I need to stop writing about this right now, because I'm afraid that combined with the drop in IQ I experienced from just watching the show, trying to dissect the show might make me a total idiot.

Have any of you watched it?

The most productive Sunday in a long time

Man, we did a lot today. Nothing huge (except lunch with Denise, Jaime, Lexi and Denise's sister Annie), but lots of little stuff.

I started the day making French toast for breakfast. It's sort of my weekend morning thing. If I'm not getting up early to go run, and I have some time, I'll make French toast if we have eggs. Today's bread wasn't stale yet, though, so it wasn't my greatest FT effort.

After breakfast, Adam and I speed-cleaned the house. I knew that Jaime and Denise would want to see the place and all the work we've done, so we picked up and vacuumed and all that good stuff. We're definitely keeping a little bit cleaner house these days, because I feel like it took less time to do the somebody's-coming-over-hurry-up-and-clean bit.

I love having the house clean, but I hate housework. So, we're not really great at it, unless we have to be. Especially during the school year. The last thing I want to do after school or on weekends is clean!

I mean, sheesh.

We had a great visit with the Wichita crew. It's been way too long since I've seen them.

After lunch, I headed over to Mom's, dropped off the rent, then went and paid the insurance bill, then went to the car wash. My car actually looks like a black car again, not some weird dusty, salty grey color any more! And, I didn't even have to wait in line.

We've been (and still are) watching the Super Bowl. While all of that has been going on, I got my snail mail letter written for Team in Training. The letter is written, the donor form ready, the envelopes addressed. I did have to make an Office Depot run for toner. Nice that my printer was free, but I paid almost $40 for toner cartridges today. Boo. Good news, though, is that I'm up to $295 in donations. If you look at my website you can't really tell that yet, since a couple of the donations were cash ones, but they'll be on there soon. Don't be left out - donate today! (A little public service announcement...)

Hopefully, I can stop tomorrow after school and get copies made, so that we can have the letters ready to send out by Tuesday or Wednesday. Last night, via Twitter, I asked Ashton Kutcher to donate to the cause. Wonder if he will. He and Demi are busy being celebs at the Super Bowl this weekend, so I might have to retweet that some other time...What's the worst that could happen? I don't get a donation from him. Figured it was worth a shot!

After the letter extravaganza, I went through six month worth of photos on my laptop, to pick out new ones I want for Crop A Ganza. I'll upload those tomorrow so I can pick them up Wednedsay on my way home from work. I love being able to upload digital photos to the photo center - so freakin' convenient.

I even knit a few rows on a pair of socks I'm working on for Adam. Can't work on the sweater while watching football. I'm working on the sleeves right now, and there's too much counting and keeping track of stuff involved.

Whoop - time out - Steelers just won.

I'm only at school four days this week. Taking a personal day Friday so I can get to Wichita early for Crop A Ganza. Looking forward to it!

After all this post-game junk is over, I'm watching "The Office" then I'm off to bed. It's a school night after all.

Hey Buuudddy! And other brushes with fame

A little while back I was tagged, and in my post, I wrote about the fact that Pauly Shore kissed me in an elevator once.

Here's the photo of us in the elevator:

I liked him a lot more in full-on Weaz mode, with the long hair and bandana, but by the time I met him (probably 2003?) he was over all that. The actual photo of this looks much better than this copy, but I shot it with my phone while it was hanging on my cabinet at school, right as I was running out the door.

Last year, one of my students asked me "Is that your husband?" when she saw the photo.

I've also had my photo taken with Lyle Lovett, Wayne Gretzky, Trace Adkins and Mike Gordon, the bassist from Phish. I got Russell Crowe's autograph and took a crap ton of photos of him, but I can't say as I've officially MET him. Being a photographer, along with attending a couple of South By Southwests really upped my celebrity quotient. Oh, and when I was a kid, I had my photo taken with Chi Chi Rodriguez, a professional golfer. In my family, we refer to him a "ChI ChI Rod rig wez" I think because Les Nessman on "WKRP" called him that once and it stuck.

Here's the pink truck I tweeted about last week while we were in Arkansas. When Paris and Nicole did their first season of "The Simple Life" they stayed in my grandma's home town, Altus. The family they stayed with is some sort of second or third cousin, twice removed or something. (Insert "everyone's cousins in Arkansas" joke here.)


Once we got back from Arkansas, I spent the rest of the holiday weekend on various tasks:

Putting up our sweet retro aluminum tree.


Researching, writing and organizing a 15-page paper on Social Cognitive Theory.


And knitting up a storm of Christmas gifts. I was sitting in the back of my parents' van, and I needed to see if I was getting close to done with the hat, so I tried it on, and shot my photo with my phone. Worked like a champ when there wasn't a mirror readily available.

Today was the first day back at school. We only have two full weeks until finals week, and on that week, we have two regular days, then three days of finals. The end of the semester will be here before I know it.

•••

If you haven't done so already, please visit the website for Dreams Work, and make a donation to celebrate their 7th birthday. Just tonight, as I was driving home from school, I heard on the radio that there is now a waiting list for Kansas Medicaid HCBS funds for disabled people between the ages of 16 and 65. Those are the funds that help pay for Dreams Work services for clients. Nice of the legislature to put a freeze on funds for people who can't help themselves, eh?

Why I'm glad I'm friends with Betsy

Because when she hears the words "Cookie Decorating Contest" this is what she comes up with:


Niiiiiice.

Oops, that family did it again

I know I'm a couple days late on this one, but I can't believe no one else in our circle o' bloggers has crowed about this. C'mon, you pop culture people!

Maybe it's because I teach high school, but the last two days, the saga of Jamie Lynn Spears has provided much-needed laughter and levity for a bunch of stressed out kids.

Thankfully, the reaction of most of the students has been utter disbelief, and general annoyance.

"Who has a live-in boyfriend at 16?!"
"Did you hear her mom's writing a parenting book?"

God, I'd love to get my hands on a copy of the manuscript that is now "on hold," most likely permanently. What I'd like to know is: WHO THE HELL thought that Lynne Spears is a likely candidate for great parenting advice? And what planet has that person been on for the last, oh, 18 months or so?

I'm sure her advice on how to get your daughters into showbiz is valuable, because obviously she's done that, and I'm sure is reaping all the benefits.

I'm not condemning Britney's sister for getting pregnant at that age - she's not the only one, and I know there are moms out there who were young, and did a great job of raising their kids. But, she's on a NICKELODEON TV show, for God's sake. You've heard me say this before: that makes here a role model, whether she likes it or not. When you're in that position, you have to make good choices. I'm sure the brass at Nickelodeon was oh-so-happy about this news.

I'm so glad I don't have a kid that I'd have to explain all this too.

Hopefully, Jamie Lynn has been storing up all the whacked-out crap her sister has been doing with her kids, and already has a pretty good idea of what not to do.

26.2 with no freaking sports bra?

The celeb sites and blogosphere is abuzz with the news that Katie Holmes (registered under a fake name) finished the ING New York Marathon in 5:29. Of course, hubby Tom and daughter Suri were there to cheer her on.

My question is: Does Scientology have some sort of magic potion that makes it so your ta-tas don't hurt after banging around for more than five hours without a trusty sports bra? A strappy tank is fashionable, and might be functional for a session of Pilates with your personal trainer, but not the best choice for running a marathon. I realize she's young, but those'll be some saggin' Maggies when she gets old if she keeps that up.

Episode 100: When did we move to Seattle?

Wow. I can't believe I've actually made it to 100 posts on this little blog.

And, along the way, at least five of my friends have joined Blogger as well. Too bad there isn't some sort of referral or finders fee!

Check out the links on the right of my blog, and you'll see that the Wichitamas blogging crew is just as sick of all this rain as I am. Headlines range from "Splish Splash" to "Rain Rain Go Away." Seriously - I think the timing of that movie "Evan Almighty" is perfect right now - because it's been raining for 40 days and 40 nights here. Thankfully, I haven't seen the animals leaving two-by-two yet, but they can't be far behind.

Our dehumidifier is working overtime in the basement - love the houses in College Hill, could stand to do without the basements. It's not flooded, but the water table is so high around here that water is seeping in through the cement.

If I'm going to live in a town where it rains and is gloomy 24/7, I would at least like to have the chance of running into Dr. Korev or McSteamy. Throw us a bone, here.

•••

Last night, we went to see Ratatouille, the new animated movie. We went to the 9:15 p.m. show and you wouldn't believe all the little ones there. I was sure that the movie would not be that crowded since it was so late. Thankfully, most of them were either a) very well-behaved or b) asleep before the previews were over.

There was one little trashy bunch sitting about three rows behind us - an aunt and her niece and nephew, and what must have been the aunt's boyfriend. While waiting for the previews to start and the lights to dim, they decided to have a belching contest. Okay, I'm sure that I might have been involved in something like that at that age, but my God, not in a movie theater. Let's teach our kids to burp in public and then bust out in fits of laughter about it, instead of saying "excuse me." I was tempted to call up Opinion Line...

•••

I might have discovered a new guilty pleasure this morning. You see, I love to look at my mom's People magazine. Well, when I was eating breakfast this morning, I found a new show on E! called "Hum." It's like a live-action version of People magazine, and you can hear all of the inane questions the papparazzi are shouting to the celebs while they are inducing epileptic seizures with all of the flash bursts. It's really strange to look and listen to what that must be like. Now I see why famous people need bodyguards. Judging by the POV of the E! shots, most of the photographers were within a foot or two of the celebrity.

Now, don't get me wrong, I'm not saying "Oh, poor little rich kids and all this attention you get." Obviously, if you choose to live that sort of lifestyle, you must put up with the trappings that come along with it. But, jeez, I can't believe the photographers are that aggressive. There is a tiny thing called personal space that we should all be allowed.

•••

I think I'll have to stop complaining about Sweaty McSweaterson. I went to Body Design class at the East Y today, and I pretty much was Sweatina McSweaterson. That class kicked my ass, and it kicked ass. I will be hurting tomorrow. That's another thing I'll miss about Doodah - I love the group exercise classes at the Y, and now Kat will be a member again, so I could go with her, but we're moving. Ugh.